“And that’s why we want all of you to be fired up about our first week without any major injuries on the job!”
Kara Balewa groaned. She was sitting in one of AsterCorp’s employee assembly rooms, a huge auditorium packed from wall-to-wall with other construction workers. At the front of the room, a short, bald man was shouting into the microphone.
The AsterCorp all-hands meetings were more like a political rally than a corporate meeting. Many of the construction workers cheered along with the motivational speaker’s words, but Kara just felt bored.
“With the space elevator near completion let me say that it couldn’t have been possible without all of you. AsterCorp is nothing without its workers. When united together, you’re the most powerful force in the world! AsterCorp will forever be your friend.”
It went on like that for hours, the man becoming red in the face from shouting so much. Kara just wanted to get away, but unfortunately, these meetings were mandatory. Kara knew of course that these meetings were AsterCorp’s response to the many protests and strikes that they’d faced after the wage cuts. Kara wondered if they really thought that mindlessly praising their employees would really make them forget that they were barely making enough money to survive. Either way, there was no important information to be heard, so Kara just waited until the meeting finally came to an end.
Kara got to her feet along with all the other workers. Already, many of them were crowding around the nutrient cube dispensaries in the back of the hall. Each one taking turns to push the button and receive a tiny cube, packed with protein and necessary nutrients.
Kara grimaced. Her diet consisted mainly of nutrient cubes, but she had her own supply at home. She never ate the free ones distributed at work. She’d tried one once and found that there was something off about it. It had stopped her hunger, but it also made her feel lightheaded, and she seemed unable to think about anything but work for hours.
She waded through the crowds of workers towards the exit. Her shift had ended, and with the all-hands meeting finally finished, she was free to go home. She walked out the front door of the meeting hall and followed the bright LED screens directing her through the facility to the transportation station. As she walked through the clean, white hallways she was passed by other workers, just beginning their shifts. Some of them wore the standard AsterCorp uniform, while others were wearing low-atmosphere suits.
Kara had never worked on the upper levels of the space elevator. She wondered how long it would be until the company decided to put her there. Maybe they hoped she’d fall to her death. She was already on pretty thin ice for being heavily involved in the protests against AsterCorp after the wage cuts. There’d already been threats against her life, but so far nobody had tried anything. She wished they would, then they’d really learn how hard it would be to keep her down.
After a lot of walking, Kara came to the transportation station. It was a huge, open room with stretches of transport capsule tracks criss-crossing over each other, winding to various platforms. Kara made her way to platform E23, where a train of transport capsules was already waiting. She found the capsule that was heading to her habitation building and closed the door. Kara was thankful that she seemed to be the only one heading that way today. The capsules had a maximum occupancy of four people, but that was only if they were all squished together.
After a short while, the doors of the capsule closed, and the train began to move. It passed through a dark tunnel, quickly gaining speed before emerging out into the city of Manta. The sun was setting in the sky, and it shined off of the windows of the city’s many skyscrapers. The gargantuan structure of the AsterCorp space elevator blocked much of the sun’s light, creating an ominous black shadow over much of the city.
As the train rumbled on, it passed by numerous switches where one track split into two. Every time it did, one or two capsules would split off from the end of the train and follow that track. First there were thirty capsules, but that quickly dropped to twenty, then ten, then finally, Kara’s capsule split off from the rest.
Her habitation building was near the center of the city, in one of the lowest levels, so the track began to wind steadily downward. Kara yawned, she was ready to go to sleep, it had been a long day of work. She was so exhausted that she didn’t notice that the capsule beginning to slow down as it neared the deepest point in the city. The sunlight barely reached the streets down there, and fluorescent lights from various businesses cast harsh shadows.
Suddenly, the capsule screeched to a halt, and Kara was thrown out of her seat. She swore and got to her feet. Looking out the window she could see that she was stopped right next to a large factory, seemingly abandoned. Just as she was starting to think about what to do, she heard a noise.
Metal clanking and scraping on concrete, and a soft whirring sound. The noise drew closer, and Kara could see a bright red light approaching through the darkness. For one brief moment she wondered if someone from the transportation company was coming to fix the capsule, but then she saw its face, and screamed.
It was solid metal, crudely hammered into the shape of a human skull. Where two eyes would be, there was only one bright red light. Kara could hear motors whining and pistons hissing as the machine walked towards her, one of it’s legs dragged, seemingly broken.
It came closer and closer, and there was nothing Kara could do. She didn’t stand much chance in a fight against a seven foot tall machine of metal. She panicked as it grabbed onto the door of the capsule and began to pry it open. She raised her fists, if she swung for its eye maybe she could blind it and escape. It tore off the door and threw it aside with a loud cash. Sirens began blaring from the capsule as it detected it had been damaged. As the machine began to reach inside the capsule with Kara preparing to fight it there was a loud bang.
The robot lurched back, waving its arms like mad as the light in its eye began to dim. Then it turned off, and the machine fell to the concrete with a loud crash. Behind where it had stood, Kara could see a woman holding a strange weapon. It looked like a gun, but there were wires running from the muzzle to the back of the robot’s head. Sparks flashed from the points where the wires had shot into metal skull.
“Come on,” said the woman, “I can only shut it down for a few minutes before it reboots, we have to move!”
She grabbed Kara’s arm and began tugging her out of the capsule.
“But wait,” said Kara, glancing back and forth between the woman and the downed robot, as she climbed out onto the street. “Who are you? And what is this thing?”
“Paola Sanchez,” said the woman. Then she pointed at the rusting sign hanging in front of the old factory. It read: Ibarra Robotics.
“This company worked with AsterCorp years ago, but they went out of business. There’s hundreds of robots inside, unfinished, just intelligent enough to be dangerous.”
Kara Balewa groaned. She was sitting in one of AsterCorp’s employee assembly rooms, a huge auditorium packed from wall-to-wall with other construction workers. At the front of the room, a short, bald man was shouting into the microphone.
The AsterCorp all-hands meetings were more like a political rally than a corporate meeting. Many of the construction workers cheered along with the motivational speaker’s words, but Kara just felt bored.
“With the space elevator near completion let me say that it couldn’t have been possible without all of you. AsterCorp is nothing without its workers. When united together, you’re the most powerful force in the world! AsterCorp will forever be your friend.”
It went on like that for hours, the man becoming red in the face from shouting so much. Kara just wanted to get away, but unfortunately, these meetings were mandatory. Kara knew of course that these meetings were AsterCorp’s response to the many protests and strikes that they’d faced after the wage cuts. Kara wondered if they really thought that mindlessly praising their employees would really make them forget that they were barely making enough money to survive. Either way, there was no important information to be heard, so Kara just waited until the meeting finally came to an end.
Kara got to her feet along with all the other workers. Already, many of them were crowding around the nutrient cube dispensaries in the back of the hall. Each one taking turns to push the button and receive a tiny cube, packed with protein and necessary nutrients.
Kara grimaced. Her diet consisted mainly of nutrient cubes, but she had her own supply at home. She never ate the free ones distributed at work. She’d tried one once and found that there was something off about it. It had stopped her hunger, but it also made her feel lightheaded, and she seemed unable to think about anything but work for hours.
She waded through the crowds of workers towards the exit. Her shift had ended, and with the all-hands meeting finally finished, she was free to go home. She walked out the front door of the meeting hall and followed the bright LED screens directing her through the facility to the transportation station. As she walked through the clean, white hallways she was passed by other workers, just beginning their shifts. Some of them wore the standard AsterCorp uniform, while others were wearing low-atmosphere suits.
Kara had never worked on the upper levels of the space elevator. She wondered how long it would be until the company decided to put her there. Maybe they hoped she’d fall to her death. She was already on pretty thin ice for being heavily involved in the protests against AsterCorp after the wage cuts. There’d already been threats against her life, but so far nobody had tried anything. She wished they would, then they’d really learn how hard it would be to keep her down.
After a lot of walking, Kara came to the transportation station. It was a huge, open room with stretches of transport capsule tracks criss-crossing over each other, winding to various platforms. Kara made her way to platform E23, where a train of transport capsules was already waiting. She found the capsule that was heading to her habitation building and closed the door.
Kara was thankful that she seemed to be the only one heading that way today. The capsules had a maximum occupancy of four people, but that was only if they were all squished together.
After a short while, the doors of the capsule closed, and the train began to move. It passed through a dark tunnel, quickly gaining speed before emerging out into the city of Manta. The sun was setting in the sky, and it shined off of the windows of the city’s many skyscrapers. The gargantuan structure of the AsterCorp space elevator blocked much of the sun’s light, creating an ominous black shadow over much of the city.
As the train rumbled on, it passed by numerous switches where one track split into two. Every time it did, one or two capsules would split off from the end of the train and follow that track. First there were thirty capsules, but that quickly dropped to twenty, then ten, then finally, Kara’s capsule split off from the rest.
Her habitation building was near the center of the city, in one of the lowest levels, so the track began to wind steadily downward. Kara yawned, she was ready to go to sleep, it had been a long day of work. She was so exhausted that she didn’t notice that the capsule beginning to slow down as it neared the deepest point in the city. The sunlight barely reached the streets down there, and fluorescent lights from various businesses cast harsh shadows.
Suddenly, the capsule screeched to a halt, and Kara was thrown out of her seat. She swore and got to her feet. Looking out the window she could see that she was stopped right next to a large factory, seemingly abandoned. Just as she was starting to think about what to do, she heard a noise.
Metal clanking and scraping on concrete, and a soft whirring sound. The noise drew closer, and Kara could see a bright red light approaching through the darkness. For one brief moment she wondered if someone from the transportation company was coming to fix the capsule, but then she saw its face, and screamed.
It was solid metal, crudely hammered into the shape of a human skull. Where two eyes would be, there was only one bright red light. Kara could hear motors whining and pistons hissing as the machine walked towards her, one of it’s legs dragged, seemingly broken.
It came closer and closer, and there was nothing Kara could do. She didn’t stand much chance in a fight against a seven foot tall machine of metal. She panicked as it grabbed onto the door of the capsule and began to pry it open. She raised her fists, if she swung for its eye maybe she could blind it and escape. It tore off the door and threw it aside with a loud cash. Sirens began blaring from the capsule as it detected it had been damaged. As the machine began to reach inside the capsule with Kara preparing to fight it there was a loud bang.
The robot lurched back, waving its arms like mad as the light in its eye began to dim. Then it turned off, and the machine fell to the concrete with a loud crash. Behind where it had stood, Kara could see a woman holding a strange weapon. It looked like a gun, but there were wires running from the muzzle to the back of the robot’s head. Sparks flashed from the points where the wires had shot into metal skull.
“Come on,” said the woman, “I can only shut it down for a few minutes before it reboots, we have to move!”
She grabbed Kara’s arm and began tugging her out of the capsule.
“But wait,” said Kara, glancing back and forth between the woman and the downed robot, as she climbed out onto the street. “Who are you? And what is this thing?”
“Paola Sanchez,” said the woman. Then she pointed at the rusting sign hanging in front of the old factory. It read: Ibarra Robotics.
“This company worked with AsterCorp years ago, but they went out of business. There’s hundreds of robots inside, unfinished, just intelligent enough to be dangerous.”
Paola pointed at Kara’s AsterCorp uniform.
“They were meant to replace you.”